The famously messy desk of Zappos.com, Inc. CEO Tony Hsieh is stacked with books, papers and piles, with soda cans, clothes, and such items as a gorilla statue and a cowboy hat strewn over the top. A small open area in the front is big enough to hold his laptop, Hsieh says in an email, and that’s “all I need.”

The mess annoyed his assistant so much that she tried to clean it up. Afterward, however, “people would come by and think it was too clean and that I didn’t actually sit there,” Hsieh writes. “So we don’t clean it anymore.”

Hsieh brushes aside the idea that the mess is a way he expresses his individuality. “It more shows what people have sent to me over the years,” he says. He mentioned in a recent interview that he likes pickles, “so now I have a lot of pickles on my desk.”

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Written and edited by The Wall Street Journal’s Management & Careers group, At Work covers life on the job, from getting ahead to managing staff to finding passion and purpose in the office. Tips, questions? email us.